Register aims to speed up adoptions
A new adoption register designed to increase and speed up adoptions for children will begin taking referrals from the end of the month.
The Scottish Government has allocated £26,282 to the British Association for Adoption and Fostering (BAAF) in 2010-11 to help set up a Scottish National Adoption Register, and is providing a further £87,934 a year for the next three financial years to run it - initially on a three-year pilot basis.
Between its launch in 2004 and February this year, the Adoption Register for England and Wales, also run by BAAF, matched 1,390 children as a result of links it had identified.
Children's minister Adam Ingram said: "The latest figures show that last year there were 15,892 looked after children in Scotland yet only 455 children were adopted.
"The statistics also show that children are becoming looked after for longer periods, creating uncertainty and potential long term social and emotional problems. This underlines the need to increase and speed up adoptions where this is in the best interests of the child.
"The Scottish Government has been looking at how best to increase adoption rates, given the long-term benefits this has for children who can no longer remain with their birth parents."
The register will go live from March 31, after which local authorities and adoption agencies will be asked to refer all children who have had a permanence decision to the register.
If they have not been matched with a family within three months of the referral, the register will begin looking for a match nationally.
It is also proposed that prospective adopters be placed on the register once a decision has been made by their adoption panel and they will be made available on the register three months later.
Barbara Hudson, director of BAAF Scotland, said: "We are very excited about establishing the Adoption Register in Scotland. If it is as successful as the one in England and Wales then there is a real potential to make a big difference to the lives of many of children across Scotland who desperately need love and stability from a forever family."
Copyright © 2011 The Press Association. All rights reserved.